Feynman's Processor
by HAL HARV and Watson
Summary: The Gunmen are asked by a legendary and mysterious hacker to help with cracking a computer that shouldn't exist: a real full-scale quantum computer. They head to Miami, where Michael Westen needs the hack to further his investigations.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: I know the time lines of these two don't exactly mesh, but this seemed like some fun when I came up with it. Set post-LGM "Tango" and just after Burn "Where There's Smoke." R&R!**

"Barry, I need a hacker."

The money launderer looked across the table at him.

"What kind?" He had contacts everywhere in the Miami underworld.

"I would prefer it if they could crack this." He slid the spec sheet over.

Barry picked it up. "Michael, this is way over my head."

"Then send it out and see who comes up. But check their history. I want someone with a perfect track record."

Barry shrugged. "I'll see what I can do."

Michael Westen smiled. "Thank you."

* * *

Two days later, Barry asked the ex-spy to meet him at the local bar.

"I have your hacker," Barry said. "It wasn't easy, but here you are." He handed over the meager contact information. "He goes by the screenname QWERTY."

"Is there a real name to go along with that?" Michael asked.

Barry shook his head. "No, but everyone I talked to swears by this guy. He's THE guy."

"How much?"

"He works on a case by case basis. Somebody told me once he didn't charge period."

That was odd. So he did it for the thrill. Michael had heard of people like that. They got off on it, and they made a game out of it. Hey, whatever floats your boat.

Michael folded the printout and slipped into an inside pocket in his jacket. "Thank you. I owe you one."

"And that's why you're picking up the tab," Barry replied.

Hey, whatever was fair.

* * *

"We just got an email," Byers said. "I think you know the author, Langly. Qwerty?"

"Dude! No way!" Langly was suddenly over at the computer craning his neck to read it over Byers' shoulder.

"Who's Qwerty?" Jimmy asked.

"He's a hacker," Langly said reverently. "He's _legendary_ on the message boards. There are tall tales of what he's done and what he's cracked. I heard one that he hacked into the DoD, FBI, **and** CIA at the same time. And I could believe it, too."

"He's that good?" Byers asked.

"Yeah. It's scary."

Frohike snorted. "No one's _that_ good. Come on."

Langly shrugged. "I've talked to him twice on IM."

"What was he like?" Jimmy asked.

"That was the odd part. He didn't seem all that different from any of us, and he was infuriatingly self-deprecating." He reached over and opened the email. He scanned through it very quickly, and he choked.

"What is it?" Byers asked.

"He wants my help." He read from the message. "'I ran across this on the message boards. I don't know where this could have come from. I want your opinion; you look into all this kind of stuff. This looks military, but it's nothing I've run across.'" He flipped over to the attached spec sheet image, and read it very carefully. "What the hell is this?" He turned the monitor around so the others could see it.

"Well, Qwert's right; it does look military," Frohike said. "But look at all that processing power." He whistled.

"How do you know it's military?" Jimmy asked.

Byers, who could read the specs even though not a computer god himself, replied, "This looks experimental. It's faster than anything out there and more powerful."

"The military always gets the best toys," Frohike added. He frowned. "Look at the processor speed. There's a typo, if I've ever seen one." The other two crammed forward to look at it.

"Infinite," Byers said softly. He looked at the others.

"What does that mean?" Jimmy asked.

"It means someone seriously screwed up," Langly replied. "If it's right, which it can't be, then we're looking at a true Feynman processor. A quantum computer."

"Richard Feynman suggested a computer could be built off of quantum mechanical principles. It would be a new type of computer that's faster and more powerful than an ordinary one," Byers explained. "They've managed to make some real leaps, and already a Feynman processor of less than 500 qbits is just as fast as the tenth fastest supercomputer."

"Qbits?" Jimmy asked.

"Pieces of information the computer processes to do calculations," Langly said. "A normal bit is either a one or a zero, binary. A qbit is pretty much the same thing, but it can be both at the same time. It allows for the computer to do more than one calculation at once."

"What? Both?" Jimmy shook his head.

"Yeah. That's what makes them so weird and so powerful. They don't play by the traditional rules," Byers replied.

"I'm going to get Qwerty up on IM," Langly said, "and ask exactly where he found this. I want to look at it myself."

He hopped on-line and called up the hacker. _"Hey just looked the specs where did you find them?"_

_"Ran across them on the message boards wild huh? :)"_

_"Feynman processor? Really? :/"_

_"*shrug* Yeah but come on! Is it really surprising if the Man already has one?"_

_"No guess not you going to try and crack it?"_

_"Yeah I need your help can you get to Miami?"_

_"Why me?"_

_"Because youll take this seriously youre into conspiracies"_

Langly looked up. "Can we get to Miami? Qwerty's going to try and crack the Feynman, and he wants our help."

"Absolutely not," Frohike declared. "I am not going back to Miami!"

"Come on, Frohike," Byers said. "Not even for a story like this? A real quantum computer like how Feynman predicted."

"No."

While they bickered, Langly went back to IM. _"Can I see where you got the specs?"_

_"Yeah heres the link:"_

Langly clicked on it. It took him to a high-traffic site where someone called ChineseLaundromat54 had started the thread "I need a Hack!" and had posted the spec sheet scanned in from a physical document. Everyone who had posted had scoffed at it and called it a fake. Qwerty was the only one to take him seriously.

Curious, Langly tapped into the site's database and searched for ChineseLaundromat's real name from the registration: Barry Burkowski. With that information, he ran a search in various databases for him. He got a hit from the FBI; apparently the man was a money launderer based in Miami the Bureau kept their eye on. The notes said he had ties to a Michael Westen. A search for Westen brought up several Internet rumors about how he was an ex-governmental spook who helped people now.

"Guys," Langly cut in. "I think I found out who wants this hack." He twisted the monitor around again. "Meet Michael Westen. Ex-government spook in the business of helping people."

"Why would he need it?" Jimmy asked.

"I would like to find out," Byers replied. "Get packing. We're going to Miami."


	2. Chapter 2

"Are you sure he's not just yanking our chain?" Byers asked as they looked around the restaurant.

"I'm not," Langly replied. "No one's seen this guy face to face. This must be pretty important." He craned his neck.

"He said he'd be in a Feynman t-shirt, right?" Jimmy asked.

"Yeah," Byers said. "Why?"

"Because that kid in the back has one on."

They looked and started walking to the surprisingly large table.

"Are you sure this guy's not just pulling your leg, Mikey?" Sam asked as they looked over the restaurant's clientèle.

"No. He works anonymously over the Internet. There's something different about this one for him." Michael replied. "But there's someone wearing a Feynman t-shirt."

They got up from their table and walked over to where a teen sat typing on a laptop. They reached the table at the same time as four men. Michael looked at them: a hippy, a bureaucrat, a ditz, and an old guy.

The Gunmen looked at the other two coming up: a drunk and Michael Westin.

"Excuse me," Sam told the others. "But we have business with this... kid."

"So do we," Byers replied. "So might I ask you to leave?"

"Actually," the kid, a tall, dark, and serious seventeen-year-old, cut in. "I want all of you here. Please sit down." He gestured to the six other chairs across the table from him. As they sat, he closed his laptop and clasped his hands. "In case you haven't figure it out yet, I'm Qwerty."

"You!" Sam snorted. "Yeah, right."

"Fine, I'll prove it. To be honest, I expected that," the kid sighed. He opened his computer again and beckoned the others to come stand around him as he put on a headset. He pulled up music first, Survivor's "Can't Hold Back," and as the downbeat hit, he started typing, his fingers blurring over the keys.

"Open System," he commanded. "Recognize Keystone. Acknowledge."

"Acknowledged," the computer said.

A new dark blue window opened, and commands poured out onto it. Three web windows opened side by side, the DoD, FBI, and US Air Force Academy.

"Start System Play," Qwerty said. "Acknowledge."

"Acknowledged," the computer said. "Rules for play?"

The Gunmen looked at each other.

"Selected User," Qwerty replied. "Acknowledge."

"Acknowledged," the computer replied. The blue window went dark, and the web windows suddenly snapped to the front.

"Play concluded," the computer informed its listener. "Acknowledge."

"Acknowledged. Keystone full command. Acknowledge."

"Acknowledged."

Qwerty sat back and dipped the mic down below his chin. "Would you like to wipe your FBI records, gentlemen? Or fly the AFA's satellite? Or learn everything about what the DoD's got cooking?" He flipped through the windows one by one as Survivor's song came to a close.

"How did you do that?" Langly asked. It was beautiful. So fast! And so incredible! He had never heard of verbal commands being used, ever. It must have been cued to his voice and key commands.

"It's a little tactic I whipped up for a multi-pronged simultaneous attack."

"The System?" Byers asked.

"Yep. Don't even ask. I'm not selling the farm."

Sam shook his head. "That's incredible."

Qwerty smiled and raised the mic back up. "Back out. Close System. Acknowledge."

"Acknowledged," the computer said. The multiple windows closed, and the kid pulled off the headset.

"So. I asked you six here to discuss the job."

The others returned to their chairs.

"Now, Mr. Westen here," Qwerty said gesturing, "asked me to crack this system." He turned the laptop around to show the spec sheet. "Now, for two you," he looked at Sam and Michael, "because I assume you know what this is," he looked over at the Gunmen, "if this isn't any kind of trick, you have managed to find a computer that currently is only supposed to exist in theory. The quantum computer as Richard Feynman suggested."

"This is way over my head, kid," Sam said. "I don't know why that's so impressive."

"Well, it's a computer so powerful and unorthodox that it can solve problems that a traditional computer could take hours to solve, or not all, like predicting the weather, in essentially zero seconds."

"You can't predict the weather," Jimmy snorted.

"No, not now anyway," Qwerty replied. "The problem is there are too many variables that you have to keep track of. Modern computers can't juggle all of that, so enough are held constant to approximate it. A quantum computer can handle all that, theoretically at least. Of course, they're getting closer. These days a punny little quantum processor not even close to Feynman's idealization rivals some of the top supercomputers on the planet. But this," he tapped the screen of his computer. "This is the true Feynman processor. Which brings me to my next question. Where did you find this? And why do you need this hacked?"

Michael replied, "I came across this in one of my investigations, and I know it has some information I need."

"That's vague," Qwerty sighed. "The problem is that this system is so big that I'd be digging through it for five years even with my System without knowing what I'm looking for."

"Can we cross that bridge when we come to it?" Michael asked.

"I suppose. I'm not in any place to make demands, I suppose. I _really_ want to crack this thing. Which brings me to you four," he looked at the Gunmen. "The Lone Gunmen. Two of you are accomplished and capable hackers. You're self-published reporters with an eye and ear for conspiracy. That's why I asked you here. Call me crazy, but an ex-government spook comes across a quantum computer and wants it hacked. What does that sound like to you? A story for you, no?"

Byers nodded. "When you put it that way..."

"Wait a minute," Sam cut in. "You think this is some kind of conspiracy?"

Qwerty looked at him. "Not as such. I think there's more to this story than even you know. Something doesn't add up. I can feel it. The Gunmen here have experience with learning the whole story, no matter where it takes them or what they do to find it."

"I think I read _The Lone Gunmen_ once," Sam said. "Something about bar codes I think. Totally and completely-"

Michael looked at him.

"Sane," Sam finished lamely.

"Tell us how you really feel!" Langly challenged.

"Langly," Byers sighed.

"Alright. All four of you are nuts!"

"Yeah? Well, at least-"

Before things could heat up further, Qwerty said quietly, "Shut up. Both of you. That's not what you're here for, and that is not what this is about. This is about the Feynman processor. I will walk out of here right now if you don't swallow your pride and try to at least fake get along. Understand?"

They nodded and took a deep breath.

"Good. Now, about the hack itself. When do you need it?"

Michael replied, "As soon as possible."

"Fair enough. Should have expected that. Two days from now?"

"I could make that work."

"Very well. You'll probably want to see it. Any place you'd prefer for it? Anywhere's good, but I'll need high-speed Internet access. And you'll have to let the Gunmen in."

Michael scribbled an address down. "Here. My mom's house. Sound good?"

"I can make that work." He looked at the Gunmen. "Can you come?"

"Absolutely," Langly said. "I want to see this."

"Will you keep me informed of your investigation?"

"Absolutely," Byers said.

"Good! I can compensate you some. Not much, unfortunately, but I can pay for the next issue of your paper."

"That's not necessary," Byers replied.

"Yes, it is. I know how much you make. You just barely scrap by. I can at least help out a little."

"Alright," Byers finally said.

Qwerty smiled. "Well, thank you. Here's a starting point." He handed them a sheet of paper.

Byers looked at it. It said something about continuing research into quantum computing for something called quantum cryptography.

"Not much, I know, but it's something," the kid said. He looked at his watch. "Now if you will excuse me, I need to get back to school. Lunch is just about over."

He closed his laptop and walked out.

"What do you think?" Frohike asked, his hatred of Miami temporarily forgotten.

Byers shrugged. "Hard to say. He's right, though. There is something more to this."

"What do you think?" Sam asked.

"He could have a point. But I want to know more about what he thinks is happening, and more about him," Michael replied. "What is it about this one that evoked face-to-face contact? And how did he get involved with this line of work, anyway?"

"We certainly have a lot more to learn," Byers said simply. "Let's get started."


	3. Chapter 3

"This is all he gave us?" Jimmy asked, looking at the single sheet of paper. It certainly wasn't much; a few figures and nothing more.

"Yeah," Langly said. "But it's all we need to get some traction on this thing." He turned back to his laptop. "That's a lot of power, and that would show up clear as day on any utilities report."

"Unless they're producing their own power," Byers reminded him.

"Yeah, but you need something to run a generator," Frohike replied. "Gasoline, natural gas, wood, something. And you'd need a lot of it. We can find that certainly."

"And I did," Langly said, pulling up a web page. "There's enough of a power drain downtown to throw up a flag, and apparently there's a huge market for liquid hydrogen in Miami, because there are thousands of dollars' worth of sales of it every year."

The others came over. This had all kinds of stink all over it. "Who buys all that?" Byers asked.

"All the sales are to fifth-level shell companies that trace back to something called the Howarth Corporation, named after Richard Feynman's second wife's maiden name."

They looked at each other.

"Is an address listed for Howarth Corp?" Frohike asked.

"Yep. Give you two guesses where it is."

"Downtown," Jimmy said.

"B-I-N-G-O."

* * *

"I don't know, Michael," Fiona said. "He called in conspiracy theorists? Are you sure about him?"

"I'm not. Unfortunately, he's the only one who took Barry seriously enough on the message boards to actually be considered for the job." He pulled a yogurt from the fridge. "And we need whatever their hiding in that system."

"Do you even know if the specs are right?"

"Yes. I do."

The door opened, and Same came in. He had a beer in one hand and a file folder in the other.

"I did that digging into these Gunmen guys." He slapped the file on the counter. Inside was a copy of their most recent paper along with their financial records and some of the skimpiest profiles Michael had ever seen for civilians. Even the witness protection program went further than this.

"There isn't a whole lot out there about them. Either they've been wiped, or they keep their heads down pretty low. Maybe a little bit of both, considering." He took a swig of beer. "Melvin Frohike and Richard Langly are hackers and total conspiracy theorists. They joined up 12 years back with John Byers. Byers was on track to becoming a high-level federal bureaucrat, but he gave it up to form the Lone Gunmen Newspaper Group with Frohike and Langly. Just this year Jimmy Bond joined them as a financial backer. There's a little more about him. He started a blind football team that lost funding. Then he moved in with the Gunmen."

"Is that all you could find?" Fiona asked.

"Not quite. They've all been arrested several times on various charges. They've always gotten out on bail, except once when they were simply released. These guys have all of their records, but there's only the arrest record that distinguishes them from anyone else. But their finances are interesting." He pulled the records out. "They just barely scrape by. They live on an issue to issue basis, and it's a miracle when they break even."

"Then how do they pay for bail?" Michael asked.

"Jimmy, but once an Yves Adele Harlow got them out. Now, there's absolutely nothing about her. Probably not her real name."

Michael frowned.

"Guys, what do we do if they get onto this?" Fi asked, looking up from scanning the paper. "These guys probably have the drive to figure it out. What if they follow this all the way?"

"We can't let the happen," Michael said. "We don't even know the extent of this. Who knows what will happen to these guys if they start looking? The people behind this have long enough arms and deep enough pockets to take them out and make it look like an accident."

"But what can we do?" Sam asked. "Bug them? Tail them? They're bound to notice."

He had a point. They were the type of people who recorded every phone conversation and kept portable bug scanners with them. They were paranoid, and for what they thought was good reason.

"Michael can just charm them, I'm sure," Fi said with a smile.


	4. Chapter 4

eThe address downtown was in a high-rise dedicated to office space. Howarth rented out the basement and half of the first floor. Officially, they were a governmental contact specializing in computer contracting who also did some of their own work. They supposedly had ties to various start-ups in Silicon Valley, but there was no clear evidence for it.

Byers and Langly made their way to the elevator and scanned the handy list of renters and their locations posted there.

"Here we are," Langly said. "Howarth."

The security guard at the nearby desk looked up in surprise. "You're here to see someone at Howarth?"

Byers and Langly glanced at each other. It generally didn't mean good things if someone asked that kind of thing.

"Yes," Byers said. "Why do you ask?"

The guard, Angua, leaned forward across the desk, suggesting she had a particularly secretive bit of information. The Gunmen walked over to her.

"Howarth's quite the secretive lot. They won't answer questions, and they don't talk to anyone from the Outside. They don't even use the front door, if they can help it. They have a door up to the back alley, and they use that. Always coming and going at all hours. And everyone I've seen of them is a scientist of some sort."

"How can you tell?" Byers asked.

Angua smiled at him. "Scientists have a certain look to them, the men in particular: sort of disheveled, an air of social awkwardness, NO fashion sense. With the women, it's a little harder to tell, but they actually hang out with these guys. And they all have that spark about them. And I managed to get their names from a few of them. It's all 'Doctor blank.'" She looked behind the Gunmen. "Here come Dr. Hix and Dr. Lipwig."

Lipwig... That couldn't be a real name, could it? It sounded familiar, somehow. Byers couldn't put his finger on it.

Byers and Langly turned and saw a man and a woman breezing in from the outside. The man was in a black trench coat buttoned all the way to the top in the Florida heat, and the woman was in a black skirt and short sleeved blue blouse. The two nodded as they passed the desk.

"Good afternoon, Angua," the woman said.

"Good afternoon, Dr. Hix. How's work been?"

"Good, thank you." The elevator doors opened, and the two walked in. When they had closed, the Gunmen turned back to the guard.

"Those are the two I see the most. Dr. Hix is the most talkative of them," Angua informed them.

The lights suddenly flickered and went out. Angua sighed.

"Does this happen often?" Byers asked.

"More than I care to count. Give it a few seconds to come back on." Sure enough, the lights flickered back into life. Angua reached down to turn her computer back on.

"When did that start?" Langly asked.

"Actually, it was right around when Howarth moved in. I never realized it before."

Byers and Langly glanced at each other again. They were both thinking about the electricity drain that showed up here.

"I think we need to get going," Byers finally said to Angua. "Thank you for your information."

He and Langly went over to elevator and pressed the button. The doors opened, and they walked in.

"Hey! Look!" Langly suddenly dropped to his knees and picked up a small brick wrapped in stiff blue plastic. Two thick wires trailed out and ended in a strangely shaped plastic piece with two terminals inside. "It's a VEX battery."

"Which is?" Byers asked. It didn't have any meaning for him.

"Small, low-volt battery for a VEX robotics kit. Dr. Frankenstein must have dropped it." He dropped it into his pocket, and Byers frowned. What were those two doing with it? Something wasn't adding up here.

He pressed the button for the basement. Less than a minute later, they walked out into a tiny reception area that was all almost blindingly white. The only immediately-noticeable contrast was a black-haired woman sitting at the desk. The plaque on her desk read, "Dr. Sandra Drumknott."

Byers frowned at it. The sums were working even less now. He _knew_ he had seen that name somewhere, and it certainly wasn't anywhere that would make it all work.

"Yes?" she asked in a measured voice.

"We're here from the utilities company," Langly said. "We're worried about the power drain in this building." He took a gamble and added, "We noticed you use the most power, so we wanted to talk to you first."

"May we talk to whoever's in charge?" Byers asked. "Now, preferably."

"Of course," she replied smoothly. She hit a button on the intercom system. "Sir, two men are here from the utilities company. They would like to speak to you. Now."

_"Send them down."_

"May I have you sign in first?" Drumknott asked and handed over a heavy ring binder.

"Sure." Byers took it and signed, "Joesph Byers," his great uncle's name. Langly wrote, "Trevor Langly."

Drumknott took the binder back and set it on her desk before standing. "If you two would follow me." She led them through a maze of small cubicles and large open spaces. There were people working mostly as several groups centered around a projector where it was open. Several debates were getting quite heated, but they stopped dead when they saw Byers and Langly walking through. Some even covered up the projector with their hand.

"What's with this place?" Langly whispered to Byers, who shrugged. There was definitely something strange going on around here.

* * *

A little digging, with a little help from Sam's various law enforcement buddies, had led them to find where the Gunmen were staying while in town. It was a small run-down motel just outside of town. Apparently the journalists didn't get very much for a lodging budget.

Michael and Jesse had come to see who they were dealing with. They had staked the place out for an hour in a bad Mexican restaurant across the way before they saw hide or hair of any of the four. The door to their single room opened, and Frohike shoved Jimmy out.

"I don't know! Just go find something!" the old guy declared.

"But you guys won't let me drive the van!"

"I changed my mind." He threw a set of keys at Jimmy. The kid's face lit up.

"Really?"

"Yes," Frohike said testily. "Now just go find a McDonald's or something. And make sure to lock the van!" He closed the door. Jimmy sighed and strolled down from the second floor to the parking lot where a green VW van that had seen the rise of dinosaurs was parked. The bumper sticker in the window said "Question Authority." Typical.

Jimmy slid into the driver's seat and started up the old engine. Whatever noise that was making probably wasn't exactly a sign of a healthy engine. It probably hadn't had an emission test in 30 years. As he pulled away, Jesse turned to Michael.

"Frohike didn't leave with him." He didn't need to say anymore. They both knew what that meant.

"I would like to see what they're keeping in that room," Michael said. "And that van."

_When you see someone protecting something that no one in their right mind would steal, like an ancient van that doesn't run right, a red flag should go up right away. There's probably something in there that _is_ worth protecting._

Jesse nodded. They could take a rather easy look once Jimmy got back and went back up to the room.

"I wonder where Byers and Langly are," Jesse said. Michael shrugged. He was about to reply when something caught his eye. He didn't stiffen but rather let his eyes turn back to the window.

"Someone's watching us," he said in a low voice. Jesse nodded almost imperceptibly and picked up the drink menu to look at it.

"Where?" he asked casually.

"Table 8."

Jesse stood and made his way toward the bathroom in that direction. He took note of the few patrons, and there was one woman who was watching him out of the corner of her eye. An all-too-short career in counterintelligence allowed him to see all the signs. She was good, but not quite good enough. It was almost like she wanted him to see it.

He entered the bathroom and came back out a few minutes later. He made his way back to his table and sat back down.

"What do you think?" Jesse asked.

"I think I would prefer it if we weren't being watched."

"And how could we arrange that?"

"With a little help from Chuck Finley." He pulled his cell out and dialed Sam. "Hey. Listen, we need your help."

Fifteen minutes later, Sam was striding into the building. He brushed past the host and made his way over to the black-haired woman sitting alone by a window. Michael noted how he had changed into his special occasions suit and was wearing a Bluetooth ear-piece, and with satisfaction, he saw Jimmy was pulling back into the motel parking lot.

"Hello, gorgeous!" Sam said ambiably as he sat down. She looked at him the way one might look at a cockroach.

"And who might you be?" she asked.

"Chuck Finley. I'm a talent agent. I saw you and thought, 'Wow!' Have you ever thought of doing any modeling?"

Michael and Jesse stood, deciding to let Sam handle it. They paid for the little they had had and headed back out. They drove across and parked next to the VW.

"Let's do it."

They didn't need to work the locks much, and Jesse whistled as he pulled open the side door.

"Look at this."

Quite a bit of electronic equipment was arranged on the shelves pushed on the far side. A sort of make-shift desk and computer dominated the space. A router squatted on the ceiling next to a periscope.

"Someone's been doing some custom work," Michael commented. He climbed inside.

"Well, this explains a lot," Jesse said. "What did you say they did?"

"Publish a newspaper." He spotted a few binders pushed all the way into the back corner, and he picked up the top one. He flipped it open. "This looks like notes for stories." He handed it over. Each page had short scribbled entries signed mostly by Byers.

"'Teletubbies is Mind-control'... 'Octium IV Chip Invades Privacy'... 'Government Breeds Super-Intelligent Chimps.'" Jesse looked up. "This sounds like crack-pot stuff."

Michael shrugged. Hey, whatever. They seemed like healthy, well-balanced people who just wanted to share what they thought they saw in the world around them. And it seemed like they had tried to assemble as much evidence as they could for the circumstances.

Well, that was all there was to see here, so they put the binder back and closed everything back up.

"I think we need to take another look at these guys," Jesse said. Michael nodded. Yes, yes they did.


	5. Chapter 5

Drumknott led Byers and Langly to an office at the very back of the basement. The plaque on the door read, "Dr. Terry Ridcully." Drumknott knocked and opened the door.

"Sir, here are the visitors."

The man at the desk looked up. "Thank you." He stood and gestured to the chairs across the desk. "Terry Ridcully," he said, shaking their hands. "Now, my assistant informs me you have some questions about our utility usage."

He was a short swarthy man with big horse teeth and a particularly bad toupee. His dark eyes were bright and intelligent, but there was something about him that you didn't want to trust in any way, shape, or form.

Byers took point. He was by far the better public relations man. "Yes. There is a large power drain centered on this building, and Howarth uses the most power here." He flipped a notebook open on his knee.

"That's not surprising. We have quite a few experimental computers down here that use up a lot of juice," Ridcully defined.

"Does that explain the small blackouts?" Langly asked.

"Probably. We have a few generators down here, but that can only do so much."

Langly suddenly stood up. "Is there a bathroom down here?"

"Down the hall, two lefts," Ridcully replied. Langly nodded and let himself out. He went down the hall but took a right. He was determined to see what these guys were up to. Something wasn't quite adding up. The feel was all wrong. These guys _were_ secret governmental contractors, but there was something about the set up.

He couldn't get more than a few steps when a klaxon started going off. He scrambled to get into the conveniently-nearby janitors closet and shut the door. A babbling stampede stormed past. He caught a few words, "Reactor... Unstable."

Byers jumped at the klaxon. Ridcully was up out of his chair.

"Excuse me. One of our key generators is freaking out. I need to make sure it's taken care of. Paranoia, you see. Please stay here."

Byers nodded and settled back down. When the sound of Ridcully's footsteps had faded, the door was opened again, this time by Langly.

"Byers!" He walked up and whispered in Byers' ear for fear of bugs and to be certainly heard over the noise. "They've got a fusion reactor!"

"What?!" He wanted to say that was impossible, but then, he saw impossible on a daily basis.

"Yeah. I just snuck my way in."

"You've got the camera on, right?" Byers hissed back.

Langly smiled widely and nodded.

Suddenly, the klaxon fell silent. Ridcully came back in.

"Sorry. That particular generator produces almost all of our power. If it failed, it would not be pretty." Ridcully sat back down like nothing had happened. "Do you have any more questions?"

"No," Byers said. "In fact, we should be going. Thank you for your time."

"Absolutely. I will lead you out. Don't want you getting lost."

There was a touch of menace to his comment that didn't slide past the Gunmen.

Ridcully led them back to the front and waved them off. When the door had closed behind them, Ridcully turned to Drumknott.

"Just great. Remind me to lessen our dependence on the city power plant. I'll have to push the fusion project forward."

Drumknott nodded. She didn't need to write it down with her wonderfully flexible memory.

"This is very worrying," Ridcully muttered.

Meanwhile, Byers asked to borrow Angua's phone to call their ride. In ten minutes, they were sitting in the van downloading the video from Langly's camera. They skipped forward a bit, and they watched as the camera headed down the hall. Turning the corner, he came to a set of glass doors. Behind them, a huge white and silver machine was set down in a large concrete pit, and dozens of scientists and technicians scrambled around it. A control panel faced the doors, and a tablet set into its face clearly read, "Fusion Rate," and it was spiking upward. The camera backed off and went back the way it had come. Frohike paused the video and backed up to a still-frame of the reactor.

"Well," Frohike said. "At least we know what they're doing with all of that hydrogen."

Jimmy looked confused. "I don't understand."

"It's nuclear fusion," Byers explained. He was usually the only one with enough patience to explain things to Jimmy. "You take a light element, like hydrogen and fuse it together to make heaver elements, like helium. The sun works that way. It produces a huge amount of energy for very little input."

"Unfortunately, it requires an ungodly amount of pressure and heat," Langly said. "It's difficult to create that, and it's still really controversial."

"Not to mention no one knows if you can actually create a self-sustained fusion reaction without being in the heart of a star," Frohike added.

"Well, I think we have our answer," Jimmy said.

"Probably," Byers agreed. He looked at Langly. "That klaxon was probably the reaction becoming unstable."

The hacker nodded. "Yeah."

"So," Frohike said, changing the subject. "Did you see if they're hiding a quantum computer down there?"

"No," Langly said. "But Ridcully said something about how they had several experimental computers. Wouldn't surprise me if they had multiple ones."

"Ridcully," Byers said. "That reminds me. Can you search for the names Ridcully, Lipwig, and Drumknott? I think I heard those names somewhere before."

Frohike typed the names into their custom less-than-nonintrusive search engine, and all three popped up on a list of Discworld characters. Scrolling through it brought up Hix as well.

"So they all have fake names?" Jimmy asked, confused.

"Yeah," Langly said. "So who are they really?"

Byers shrugged. "I think we have to find out."

The IM window popped up. Qwerty wanted to talk. Langly clicked on it.

_"Yeah?"_

_"Westen wants to talk to you, at his place." _Qwerty gave him the address.

_"When?"_ Langly asked.

_"In an hour." _

Langly looked up. "Guys, Westen wants to talk in an hour at his place." He showed them the address.

"That's across town," Frohike said. "We need to get going."

* * *

An hour later, Jesse stood at the window and watched as the ancient VW van pulled onto the concrete pad.

"Here they are."

Michael nodded and answered the door when they knocked.

"Come in," he said with that smile of his. Byers looked at him, and that, for some reason, sent shivers up Michael's spine. Those eyes were open, expressive, and empathic, and he was sure they could see right into his soul.

"You said you wanted to talk," Frohike growled. "What's this about?"

"Oh, come on!" Sam said amiably. "At least sit down!" He gestured to the couch with his bottle of beer. He was probably half-drunk. Fi stood with her arms crossed against the wall, and Jesse looked on from the kitchen.

The Gunmen sat down on the couch. "Well?" Byers asked.

"Qwerty said you publish a paper," Fi said. "Tell us about that."

"Why do you need to know?" Langly demanded.

Michael sighed. "We want to know why Qwerty called you, of all investigators."

Langly jumped up, fire in his eyes. "He called us because we'll blow the whistle on this mess!"

Frohike grabbed Langly and dragged him back down. The kid would probably reveal the little they had found if he got angry enough.

"What mess?" Jesse asked curiously. The Gunmen looked at him. They hadn't met him or Fi yet.

"Oh," Sam said. "This is Jesse and Fiona, friends of ours," he introduced.

"What mess?" Jesse repeated. The Gunmen glanced at each other. Frohike nodded once, while Langly shook his head. Byers looked at Langly and nodded slowly.

"We think there's a lot more to the guys who have the Feynman than we originally thought," Langly said sulkily.

Sam laughed. "**I** could have told you that!"

"He means there's more than **we** thought," Byers said. "We've been doing this for a long time. We can usually judge something's size by just looking at it. This is larger than we thought at first glance." He didn't add that they usually misjudged that something. They certainly didn't have perfect sight in that regard.

"Then how big is it?" Fi asked.

The Gunmen looked at her. "We don't know," Byers admitted. He hesitated then decided to give them a little more. "We've been looking into something called Howarth Corp."

Jesse started. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah," Jimmy said. "Why?"

"Because I think I've heard of them." Everyone else was looking at him. "I did some looking into Management and Vaughn a while back, and both are connected to them."

"Vaughn?" Frohike asked.

"A friend," Michael said in the tone of voice that said that he and Vaughn were more like enemies who had found some sort of common ground.

"Okay," Sam said. "Cards on the table time."

The Gunmen nodded. It would be nice if they could all have all of the information.

So, Team Michael explained their own investigation into the shadow group Management, or at least, as much as they would, and Team Gunmen explained what they had found the past day or so, or at least, as much as they would.

And the whole picture became clearer in some ways, but a lot more complicated in others.


End file.
